Mini Tarts with bitter chocolate , orange custard and marmalade filling

A pastry dough is something i keep in my fridge at all times . It stays well for up to 3-4 days in an airtight container and is extremely easy to put together for a quick dinner dish or a dessert . The beauty of dishes with pastry dough is that even though the base element remains the same , one can elevate the taste by experimenting with the filling . One can go both sweet or savory and make a fancy quiche or a simple fold together galette - all with the same dough.

There are two main reasons why i love Mini tarts made with pastry dough - First , they are small in portion size , so one can gauge how many is eaten and try (!) to stop before going overboard . Second , the diaspora of possible fillings is very large . In the savory palette , one can experiment with meat & cheese , spinach & soft scramble , tomato & creme cheese and mustard , mushroom & mozzarella , all of which are mindbogglingly good. On the sweet side, one can try lemon curd ( my personal favorite -you can refer my layered lemon cake recipe for how to make lemon curd ) , dates and walnut , chocolate and mint leaves , salted caramel and oats , apple cinnamon etc etc. So , yes , the options are very wide . All you need to do is make the pastry dough and shove it into your fridge. The rest will follow ! Let me show you how ...

Things you will need for the dough ( Makes approx 10-15 mini tarts )

• 100 gm cold butter - chopped in small chunk size pieces

• 01 and 1/2 cups of plain flour

• 01 tsp salt + 01 tsp powdered sugar

• Ice cold water

• Mini tart tins

Steps to follow

1. Sieve the flour , salt , sugar into a mixing bowl - add in the cold butter and rub together lightly with your hands - Note it is important that the butter does not completely get mixed and you should be able to see some chunks of butter in the finished dough . This is what will make your pastry flaky , as it bakes . Incorporate everything into a dough - using ice cold water . Do not over knead the dough as the heat of your palms will melt the butter out .

2. Divide the dough in two portions - wrap it in cling film and keep in the freezer while you prepare the mini tart tins.

3. Lightly baste the mini tart tins with some butter and keep aside

4. Roll the dough into a large round base ( work only with one portion of the dough at a time , while the other sits in the refrigerator to avoid the butter from melting ) . Cut out roundels ( as in the picture above ) and line all the tart cases individually .

5. Press the dough roundels into the tins - watch that you have no air bubbles trapped in between . Take a fork and prick the tarts to let air bubbles escape , if any . As you are done lining a few tins , put them back into the fridge , while you complete the others with the remaining dough .

6. Heat the oven to 180 degrees

7. Place baking weights in each tart or a hand full of rice to avoid them from rising as they bake.

8. Bake the tarts for the 1st 10 mins - then remove them from the oven , empty out the rice or baking weights and bake for another 15 mins till crisp and done.

9. Cool overnight , before filling .

10 Make a-ahead these tarts shells and store in an airtight container to use later .

Things you will need for the filling

• 100 gm bitter dark chocolate

• 01 cup Milk

• 1/2 cup granulated sugar

• 02 egg ( yolk only)

• 01 tbsp orange essence

• 03 tbsp store brought marmalade

Steps to follow

1. Break the dark chocolate into chunks and put them together in a heat proof glass bowl .

2. Place the bowl on a double boiler and melt the chocolate till glossy and keep aside

3. Melt the marmalade in a microwave safe bowl separately ( Approx 1 min) and keep aside

4. For the custard , in a heavy bottom pan heat together the sugar and milk till slightly thickened - Add the orange essence and take off from heat .

4. Beat the egg yolks in a separate bowl and pour the milk - sugar mix into the eggs .

5. Move the egg - milk - sugar mixture back into the pan and cook , stirring continuously allowing the egg to cook and custard to thicken .

6. Layer the tarts with the melted chocolate and let it cool completed

7. Follow chocolate with a a layer marmalade and custard and chill . Serve once everything is set .